CHRIS Metters will be swapping sunny Melbourne for frosty Birmingham this winter – and is quite happy with the switch as he prepares to build on a promising first season for Warwickshire.

Twenty-one-year Metters has spent the last two winters playing club cricket in Australia and his grounding there no doubt helped him this year when he rose unexpectedly early into the Bears’ first team.

The left-arm spinner took a match-winning six for 65 on his debut against Worcestershire and went on to show that, along with promising ability, he certainly has the temperament for first-class cricket.

Part of that temperament is the knowledge that his talent is very raw and needs some serious honing in the indoor centre at Edgbaston before the notoriously difficult second season begins in April.

“This will be a massive winter for both my batting and bowling,” he said. “I will spend it here working on my fitness and all parts of my game with the coaching staff.

“The last two winters I have spent playing club cricket in Melbourne which was fantastic and, looking ahead, I would like to play cricket all-year round as long as I can stay fit. But at this stage of my career it’s important that I stay home this winter. Hopefully that will stand me in good stead for the years ahead.

“I want to be not just a bowler but a spin-bowling all-rounder and so I am going to work really hard at turning myself into a better batsmen. They always say your second year is the hardest but hopefully by learning a lot last season that will be a big stepping-stone for me towards a long career with Warwickshire.

“Our squad has a lot of potential. In the last game, apart from Shiv Chanderpaull, only Jim Troughton was over 30 so the squad is nowhere near reaching it’s full potential yet. I am the youngest at 21 but there are people like Keith Barker and Laurie Evans and then there are Boyd Rankin and Will Porterfield only 26, and Rikki Clarke only 29. We have got a bright future and I want to contribute as much as I can to it.”

Devon-born Metters, who was recommended to Warwickshire by their former coach Bob Cottam, has proved a useful late-order batsman and capable fielder. But he knows that his specialist trade of spin-bowling is the one from which he team needs most from him. It is helpful, then, that the two main coaches are former England left-arm-spinner Ashley Giles and one of the county’s most highly-regarded bowling coaches in Graeme ‘Pop’ Welch.

“Ash is a big help and if anything goes wrong I have always got someone to turn to,” he said. “Not just Ash but Pop too because he deserves massive credit for what he has done with the bowlers this year. Even though Pop wasn’t a spinner he is a great guy to talk to about the game. I can’t speak highly enough of him for what he is doing at the club.”